


it's a wonderful night

by badtemperedchocolate



Category: Bon Appétit Test Kitchen RPF, Chef RPF
Genre: Brad Leone - Freeform, Claire Saffitz - Freeform, F/M, RPF, Stolen Moments, Total Fluff, it'll ruin your teeth, like Claire's Starbursts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-04 23:36:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20479331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badtemperedchocolate/pseuds/badtemperedchocolate
Summary: It’s the kind of fancy-ass office party that Brad grumbles about, but always ends up enjoying in spite of himself.





	it's a wonderful night

**Author's Note:**

> rpf. 100% fiction. you know the drill.

It’s the kind of fancy-ass office party that Brad grumbles about, but always ends up enjoying in spite of himself.

Sure, he has to lose his cap and put on a dress shirt. But the music’s good, the night view of Manhattan is stunning, and the food and booze are top-notch, so how much can a guy really complain?

And then Claire walks in wearing a sparkly little silver dress that makes her look like an absolute fucking goddess and Brad almost drops his scotch. He’s mid-conversation with Chris and Carla, but as he turns to watch Claire shimmer her way across the room, he misses the knowing look they exchange over their own glasses.

She comes to join them, white wine in hand, and Brad can’t help the grin that he’s pretty sure has been plastered to his face since the moment she floated in like some kind of walking, talking ray of pure moonlight. Even though he’s not had nearly enough booze to be getting so poetic.

Yet, anyway.

“Claire, honey! You look fabulous.” Carla beams, waving a hand vaguely at her. “I _love_ this on you.”

“Thanks.” Claire tucks her hair behind her ear, looking down self-consciously. “Molly convinced me to wear it.”

“Oh, she was right,” Carla assures her. “This is a knockout.”

“Yeah, for sure,” Brad interjects, hoping he sounds less awkwardly eager than he feels. “You look awesome, Claire.”

She looks up at him – despite her heels, she’s still far shorter than he is – and those big, soft dark eyes, her long lashes, the soft rosy flush of her lips, it all catches him completely off guard, especially when her smile softens, the way it always seems to do for him.

“Thanks, Brad.” She nudges him with her shoulder. “You clean up pretty good yourself.”

Any lingering resentment he’d had about combing his hair and wearing dress shoes and using an actual fucking _iron_ on his clothes dissolves, because she’s shooting him the kind of lingering glance that says she might maybe kind of think he looks _handsome_, and it’s enough to make him feel like a million bucks.

She drifts off to chat with someone else, and Brad goes back to his conversation with Carla and Chris, though it takes him a while to remember what they were talking about before Claire walked in.

* * *

It’s probably not a good thing, how quickly he notices Claire’s disappeared.

The party’s buzzing along, everyone’s in a good mood, but it’s missing dark eyes and an adorable giggle and it just doesn’t feel right without them.

Amiel says she mentioned wanting to run down and check on something in the test kitchen, and Brad can’t help but shake his head, because isn’t that just the most _Claire_ thing he’s ever heard?

* * *

Brad rounds the corner towards the elevators just as Molly and Gaby join Amiel, and Molly frowns. “Where’s Brad going?”

“He’s looking for Claire.” Amiel rolls his eyes. “To no one’s shock.”

Gaby sighs. “I should have taken tonight in the pool.”

* * *

“Figures I’d find you here.”

Claire looks up, startled, and Brad can’t help but grin. She’s pulled her hair back and tied an apron over her dress, and now she’s standing at the counter in front of a bowl of something, looking faintly guilty at being caught.

“I – was just –”

“Yeah, yeah. I know.” He shrugs. “Need a hand?”

Her eyes soften at that, and the smile she gives him is just so beautiful he doesn’t know what to do about it.

“I don’t think so. I just wanted to see how well this was setting.”

He settles back against the counter, folding his arms. “And?”

“It’s getting there.” She peers into the bowl again. “I think. Kind of hard to tell. I put it in this afternoon, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to leave it overnight or pull it now.”

He’s not even sure what she’s working on, but it doesn’t matter. He knows how she works. Claire’s perfectly capable of making something by herself; he occasionally has a good idea, but she usually just finds it helpful to talk her way through things.

“You wanna try something, or let it be?”

“I think I can let it be. For now. We’ll see how it sets up.” She re-wraps it, sets it aside, and pauses, thinks for a long moment. “Well, as long as I’m here, I might as well…”

Her voice trails off as she goes to one of the cabinets, pulls out a tray of wafers, and peels off the plastic wrap, poking at one carefully before picking it up and breaking off a small piece. “Hmm.”

“Good or bad?”

“Still too soft.” She frowns thoughtfully. “I don’t think they’re going to get crispy.”

Ah. ‘Crispy.’ He knows what that means. “Dehydrator?”

She looks up at him hesitantly. “If you wouldn’t mind –”

“On it!” He slaps the counter and takes off across the kitchen, her laughter floating after him.

He likes making her laugh.

Ever since the first time he heard her dissolve into giggles over a stand mixer, it’s been one of his favorite sounds in the whole world. There’s just something that happens when he sees her eyes light up that way, and he finds himself looking for that reaction more often than not. Making her laugh brightens everything.

When he lugs the dehydrator back to her station, he pauses for a moment, watching her fuss with the tray. This is how she makes the most sense, he thinks. Lovely, funny, sweet, but always thinking. Always working. Always trying to get it right.

And so pretty, even with that apron tied over her dress. That’s Claire. That’s her. She’s an adorable little bundle of wit and intelligence and smiles, and he’s pretty sure there’s absolutely nothing he wouldn’t do for her.

He pauses. “Do you wanna – why don’t you just tell me what to do?” She tilts her head, confused, and ah jeez, he’s just gonna come out and say it. “Claire, you look so pretty. I don’t want you to mess up your dress.”

For a moment, he thinks she’s going to argue, but to his surprise, she smiles a little shyly. “All right. I can work with that.”

She settles on the counter, leaning back on her wrists as Brad arranges the wafers.

“Like this?”

She nods. “Looks good.”

“You sure? You don’t wanna grab the ruler, measure each one, get a microscope, scootch one of ‘em over like half a quarter of a millimeter – ”

“Brad –”

“- maybe just meditate for a second to fix the feng shui –”

“_Brad!”_

She covers her face with her hands, laughing, and the warmth in his chest is overpowering. “All right, all right. I’ll let it go.”

He slides the sheet into the dehydrator, fits the cover, and throws his hands in the air. “See? See how easy cooking is?”

“Getting you to do it for me? Yeah, I can do that.” Her eyes sparkle. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” Brad leans back against the counter beside her. Sitting up like this, her feet dangling in the air, she’s almost as tall as him. Sort of. “This is where the real party is.”

Claire huffs. “Sure.”

It sounds kind of self-effacing, like maybe she’s feeling down, and that’s just something he can’t have, because an unhappy Claire Saffitz is Brad’s cue to try and make it better. “You know I like hanging out with you, right?”

“You must. There’s an open bar upstairs.”

“I mean it. I’m glad you’re still around.” He shakes his head. “It just wasn’t the same without you, you know?”

She leans over to nudge his shoulder with hers, now that she’s closer to his height. “You missed me, huh?”

“More than you know.”

It’s more honest than he’d meant to be – ah, shit, he doesn’t want to scare her off – but the look in her eyes makes him feel open and greedy, like he’s just got to say everything and to hell with reason and common sense and holding back.

She tilts her head, watching him evenly. “What?”

She’s looking at him like she knows what he’s thinking, and he has no idea what to say, how to answer, so he does the only thing that makes sense. He kisses her.

It’s soft and delicate and perfect. As unbalanced as he feels sometimes, as scattered and loud and all over the place, there’s nothing right now but her, kissing him back in this quiet kitchen, one small hand pressed against his chest, over the spot where he’s pretty sure his heart is beating out of his chest.

She’s smiling into his mouth, and fuck if he doesn’t feel like the absolute luckiest fucking asshole on planet Earth, because Claire Saffitz is kissing him back in the middle of the test kitchen, next to the dehydrator, and this is probably the only thing in the world that he wants.

* * *

Neither of them glances back at the door to the test kitchen, so they don’t see Gaby and Chris and Carla and Molly peering through, beaming at the sight.

**Author's Note:**

> professortennant tricked me into this fandom. and by "tricked," I just mean "convinced me to start watching Gourmet Makes and It's Alive, and then I just fell in love with it all." because there's chemistry...and then there's CHEMISTRY.


End file.
